


Don't Suppose I'll Ever Know

by elfiepike



Category: Panic At The Disco
Genre: M/M, Spin the Bottle, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-11-28
Updated: 2007-11-28
Packaged: 2017-10-13 13:52:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,545
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/138077
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elfiepike/pseuds/elfiepike
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They go to the party mostly because there isn't anything better to do.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Don't Suppose I'll Ever Know

**Author's Note:**

> Title from the Goo Goo Dolls' "Slide". Originally posted [here](http://inthekeyofpike.livejournal.com/28942.html).

They go to the party mostly because there isn't anything better to do. Brendon should probably go home and sleep; he has the early shift at work the next day. Sometimes, though, the prospect of getting out of rehearsal and then going straight to his apartment makes him want to get hit by a car just so he can stop and rest for a moment.

The four of them arrive just as a everyone's about to start a game of spin the bottle. "Ryan, hey!" a girl calls out, because Ryan always knows someone at these kinds of things. "Sit over here!"

She has black hair and a black t-shirt and glossy lips, and she's smiling wide, her eyes bright.

Brendon would think something mean about how even Ryan has to have people who are happy to see him, but he feels amped up by the mood of a roomful of teenagers, most of whom are on their way to being drunk if they aren't already there, and instead grins at Brent and Spencer before sitting down in an open spot on the floor in front of a lamp.

Someone--Brendon really doesn't know anyone at the party, anyone at all, beyond his bandmates--starts the game out, spinning a generically dark bottle on the ground, the label peeled off by expert fingers so there's only the tiniest, jagged bits of white left. He's not really paying attention, to be honest, because it makes him feel--lonely, sort of, and therefore pathetic, when he watches other people make out, so he looks around the room and makes up stories about the people who actually live here instead: they're on a business trip and will come back before the night is out, they are upper-class hippies who believe in letting their child have as much freedom as he or she needs, they are somewhere at a party depressingly like this one instead of being at home.

Brent says, "Don't chicken out, Ryan," with a low chuckle in his voice, and Brendon looks up.

Spencer and Ryan have crawled to the center of the haphazard circle of people, on their knees. Ryan leans in first, pretty clearly just going to go with a cheap kissing-cousins peck on the lips, and then someone shouts, "No way, rules are rules," and Ryan puts his arm on Spencer's shoulder and goes for it for real. Spencer's eyelashes flutter when he closes his eyes; his cheeks look so soft next to Ryan's bony chin and nose.

There are cat-calls when their mouths open. Spencer's hands are braced just barely against the carpeting, and he licks Ryan's lips and then into his mouth, a steady rhythm.

Brendon only realizes that he was holding his breath when they stop a moment later and he finds himself breathing in quickly through his nose.

Spencer tosses his head, somehow getting his hair further into his eyes, and scoots back to the edge of the circle. Ryan takes hold of the bottle, his lips still glistening.

\---

Eventually the crowd gets bored by the game. Brendon catches sight of Ryan wandering down a hallway with the girl and wonders if that's the only reason they came here in the first place. He doesn't want to go home yet, still, so he makes friends with guy in a Fall Out Boy shirt (his name is Mark and he goes to the same school as Spencer, it turns out); they talk about music and Brendon mentions that he's in a band. "We're gonna be big, someday," Brendon says, full of bravado, "but in the meantime, I gotta head out. If I go home now, I can get six full hours of sleep before I have to work tomorrow."

"Good luck with that," Mark says, laughing.

Brendon makes sure Brent has a ride home and heads out the door.

Spencer is standing on the porch, leaning against the railing with a plastic cup in his hand. "Hey, Brendon," he says, when it's clear that Brendon's noticed him.

"Spence," Brendon says. "What's up?" He stands next to Spencer, looks out onto the lawn and late-night lights of suburbia.

Spencer shrugs. "Nothing." He looks into his cup, and then puts it to his lips, throwing back his head and swallowing the rest. His throat moves each time he swallows. When it's empty, he takes the cup away from his mouth and says, "I've maybe had a lot to drink."

Brendon watches him put the cup carefully down on the ground. "You don't drink, do you?"

"Nope," Spencer says.

"Um," Brendon says.

"You leaving?" Spencer asks. Now that Brendon's looking for it, he can see the flush in Spencer's cheeks, and the easy way he stands, hips cocked and shoulders relaxed.

"Yeah," Brendon says. "Busy day at the smoothie hut tomorrow and all."

Spencer nods, then asks, "Have you seen Ryan?"

"I saw him go off with a girl, if that's what you mean." Brendon feels like he's making a joke, but it falls flat when Spencer's expression sours. Brendon thinks about the way Spencer had been so careful of his hands, earlier, during the game, and how he had only leaned in so close before pulling back. "Doesn't it," he starts, and then thinks maybe he's being too loud, "does it bother you? When he--does that?"

Spencer shrugs again, but doesn't pretend to not know what Brendon's talking about. "He's my friend, Brendon. Not my _date_."

There's still something about it, something in the way Spencer's mouth stays twisted down, even though he looks like he's probably about to fall over.

"Spencer, dude," Brendon says, "how much have you had to drink?"

Spencer waves a hand in the air, evidently intending it as an elegant summary of his intoxication.

Brendon knows for a fact that the punch in the kitchen is at least half vodka; he knows because he wandered in when it was being refilled.

"I think," Brendon says, "I think I'm gonna take you back to my place, okay?"

"I got a ride with Ryan," Spencer says, but he doesn't sound heavily invested in it.

"No, really," Brendon says, and reaches out to put an arm over Spencer's shoulder, herding him down the steps. "It's cool, you'll come over, I'll wake up way too early and you can get Ryan to pick you up later, and he won't have to see you drunk, because, you know, and this is just an impression I have, but I think he doesn't actually think it's all that awesome when people are drunk." There, the last step.

Spencer hasn't said anything, but he makes a face again at the mention of Ryan.

Brendon tries to figure out where he was going with that, and heads in the direction of the car. "You might think you want Ryan to see you like this, but he's already so--he's such, uh."

"A drama queen?" Spencer snorts. He's leaning on Brendon now, like he maybe doesn't realize that he's doing it. "Except you're the real queen, right, Brendon? I mean," Spencer says, the words drunkenly deliberate, "you like boys for real, don't you?"

Brendon feels something in him freeze up, even as his feet still take step after step.

"I could be wrong, I admit it," Spencer continues, because apparently once he's started he's just going to keep going, "but I'm pretty sure you're gay, right? You wouldn't mess with a guy like that, fuck." Spencer pulls Brendon awkwardly to face him, getting right into Brendon's space, and kisses him.

It's nothing like he would have imagined from watching Spencer and Ryan kiss. It's sloppy and uncoordinated and tastes like that terrible fruit juice that they were mixing the vodka with, but. Spencer was totally right, totally and completely right, even if Brendon hasn't been able to say it to anyone else yet. Spencer's hands have found Brendon's face and his fingertips are damp and cool, and, well.

Truthfully the whole thing is a little overwhelming; Brendon doesn't even have time to react before Spencer's pulled himself away, looking green. "Oh God," Spencer says. "I think I'm gonna be sick," and he throws up in the gutter.

\---

They sleep together on Brendon's bed, but that mostly means that Brendon wakes up every few hours when Spencer shakes the mattress, getting up for another glass of water or to use the bathroom.

Spencer forgets to shut the door to the bathroom and it's only a crappy one-room apartment, there's just not enough space for privacy if the door isn't shut. Brendon's half-asleep and doesn't think to be embarrassed, to close his eyes and look away, and ends up watching Spencer stand over the toilet with his back to the open door. Brendon's always thought that Spencer's body is awkwardly disproportionate, but because Spencer always seems so comfortable in his own skin, the coltish length and shape of Spencer's legs and the soft, round parts of his belly and face transform into their own kind of perfection.

Maybe this is a dream, Brendon thinks, still staring when Spencer comes back out. Spencer sees him, or maybe Brendon's eyes just happen to look at Spencer's at just the right moment, and Spencer says, "Go back to sleep."

Brendon does.


End file.
